Should Germany Be a Permanent Member of the UN Security Council? On the Efforts to Reform the United Nations

Abstract

In 2005, to mark the 60th anniversary of the foundation of the United Nations, a concerted attempt was made to expand the UN Security Council, in which Germany has expressed its interest for over a decade. This attempt failed, and is highly unlikely to be successful in the near future. There is consensus only with regard to the fact that the number of members of the Security Council should be increased and the geographical distribution of the seats should be made more representative. There was already widespread agreement that India, Japan, Germany, Brazil and two African states should be accepted as permanent members of the Security Council, while three or four additional states should become non-permanent members. However, it remained unclear which African states should be given preference (South Africa, Nigeria, Egypt), and above all, whether and when the new permanent Security Council members should be given the right of veto, or even whether the old members should relinquish or limit their right of veto.

All governing parties of the united Germany are in favour of Germany being granted a permanent seat in the UN Security Council, without having or seeking much support for such a move among the population. However, observers from the academic and public spheres see this as being a re-nationalisation of German global policy, while others are in favour of a reduction to a single “European” seat in the Security Council.

Since any revision of the Charter is an extremely difficult task, the UN system has to date adapted in part to the new challenges primarily through a dynamic interpretation of the Charter and the foundation of numerous new sub-organs, separate organs and separate organisations. Here, there is also an opportunity for promising reform efforts in the foreseeable future. The legitimacy of decisions made by the Security Council can be considerably strengthened by creating new auxiliary organs in accordance with Art. 29, through more extensive recourse to regional agreements and organs in accordance with Articles 52 and 53, and through the stronger involvement of the General Assembly in accordance with Articles 10–12 of the UN Charter, as a result of which non-members of the Security Council can also be involved in its decision-making process. In a sub-organ of the Security Council for peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations, both the main funders and the states which provide the troops, police and civilian personnel can be granted rights to participate in the preparation of peace missions by the Security Council. As a global economic power, Germany has numerous unexploited opportunities to bring its great influence to bear on the policies of the UN, prevent and eliminate threats to freedom and thwart breaches of the peace and acts of aggression.